


Some Rise By Sin

by thelilacfield



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Betrayal, Family Drama, Family Feels, Gen, Skywalker Family Feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-09
Updated: 2016-03-09
Packaged: 2018-05-25 19:11:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6207052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelilacfield/pseuds/thelilacfield
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A month after Luke Skywalker was discovered in his exile, an attempt is made on General Organa's life. Though unsuccessful, it creates distrust and unease in the Resistance base, as rumours whisper of a traitor in their midst. The situation is no better for the First Order, as their plans are constantly foiled by foes who seem to be consistently a step ahead. Times are dark, no one knows who to trust and the young fighters for both sides are trapped trying to solve every problem alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Some Rise By Sin

**So this is more of a prologue, to test the waters with this prompt. Although this does intrigue me, and I am excited to explore the world with these conditions in place! Title taken from Shakespeare's _Measure For Measure_. Inspired by [this prompt](http://tfa-kink.dreamwidth.org/1841.html?thread=3128625#cmt3128625) on the TFA kink meme**

* * *

****The air hums with the clash of blades, blue on green, each blow whining in the silence. Eyes flash as the snow whirls in the black skies, dark hair whipping around a face set with determination, the cold wind sharp as knives on bare skin. A swipe that would surely have rent flesh is parried with a grunt of exertion, robes swirling elegantly in the heat of battle. But the ice beneath their feet is lethal, and one slips straight down with only a breath to express their shock, and the next moment they lie with the tip of a lightsaber pointed at their throat.  
  
A hood is lowered, and Rey grins mischievously down at Luke, the projection of snow and ice fading into the training centre with its beige walls and soft, safe floors. “You’re getting slower,” she says as their lightsabers withdraw into their hilts, and offers a hand to help him to his feet. “That’s the fifth time in a row I’ve beaten you!”  
  
“You’re growing stronger every day,” Luke says, without resentment. There’s only pride in his eyes, pride that warms her heart and strengthens her resolve. “But you must remember that there are still many terrains to practice on, and you will never face foes in such controlled environments.”  
  
Rey just rolls her eyes, taking a drink and shedding the heavy robes. “I’ve fought in snow and ice before, and I won that fight.” The memories still haunt her in the night, the sounds of battle rising above the ebb and flow of the tide and the gentle splashes of the creatures that haunt the surrounding oceans.  
  
“You’re facing someone who has been training for twenty years,” Luke warns her, as if she hasn’t heard this lecture before. “Kylo Ren is leading others, and we’re all facing the First Order. A month’s training will barely make a difference, even in one as powerful as you.”  
  
“In the first place-” The indignance dries in her throat when she turns and sees that Luke has gone suddenly pale, his eyes hollow with fear. “Master? What’s wrong?”  
  
“Have you felt the Force?” Luke asks, his voice sounding hollow and scared to her ears, and she is paralysed. He speaks without even looking at her, gaze distant. “It surrounds every living thing, and those who believe can manipulate it. We can feel the way it moves around everything - we sense when people are in danger by the flicker of the Force around them.” He finally turns back to her, eyes shadowed with fear. “We have to go to the Resistance. Now.”  
  
There’s an urgency in his voice that drives her, his eyes so haunted, and she runs to the Falcon, firing up the controls as Luke comes aboard, laying a hand on Artoo as the droid frantically beeps and rocks from side to side and staring out at the skies with an expression as still as stone. “Master?” she chances, keeping her voice soft. Luke still starts, as if lost in a world of his own. What did you sense? Who’s in danger? Is it the Order?”  
  
“My sister,” Luke breathes, and the air seems to grow colder as Rey’s heart drops like a stone at the very words she feared. “Leia is in danger. I don’t...I can’t sense the danger itself. It may have already come to pass. We have to be fast.”  
  
“Then strap yourself in,” Rey says, flicking switches to prepare for the jump into hyperspace, setting their destination, busying herself at the controls to stop her mind from running amok with wild imaginings of all the terrible happenings Luke’s feelings could mean. The stars blur and the galaxy flashes past in a matter of seconds, as they leave the quiet ocean and the emptiness and the anonymity behind, immersing back into the war and the danger and the galaxy as it is beyond isolation.  
  
D’Qar is grey in the early morning, the dampness of the clouds hanging mistily in the air, and Luke can’t seem to stop nervously moving as Rey dips the Falcon into landing, clenching her fingers tighter to keep her hands from shaking with fear. She can see the orange uniforms of the pilots among the crowd assembling at the landing bay, and her legs tremble as she stands, leaning briefly on the solid back of her chair for support. Luke rises gracefully, pulling his robes closer around himself and raising his hood, shadowing his face and hiding so many of the changes the passing years have wrought to his countenance.  
  
As she steps back out into the Resistance base, Rey dares to let herself hope that it was a fluke, or the danger was stopped by one of the many proud warriors inhabiting this planet. But the solemn expressions of everyone surrounding them dashes every hope and every desperate wish, and she has to swallow a sudden, sharp rising of tears as Poe approaches her, his hands held out hopelessly and tear tracks shining on his cheeks. With a respectful nod, he blinks tired eyes at them and says, “Master Skywalker, I am so sorry that your return to the Resistance comes after something so terrible.”  
  
“What happened?” Rey asks desperately, heart still filled with desperate, useless hope, even seeing the tears scarring people’s skin and feeling the sadness that hangs like a breeze in the air.  
  
“Someone from the Order managed to break through our defences undetected, knocked out guards in the process,” Poe explains, his voice shaking to match the trembling of his exposed hands. “Somehow they managed to find their way to the core of the base. General Organa was in her chambers, without her guard. It...we heard a yell and ran to her, but the infiltrator had already left. They shot her, it was almost fatal. She’s in the med-bay.” A quiet splinter of a sob issues from a member of the crowd, and Rey has to fight not to collapse to the ground in shock and sadness.  
  
“I have to see her,” Luke says, and the crowd parts easily for him, people fading back into their every day business as he moves swiftly through them, robes billowing behind him as Rey follows him, head spinning with fears. Poe says Leia is in the med-bay, so she has to be alive - but he also says the shot was almost fatal. Is she clinging to life by a thread, fading with every moment, the galaxy on tenterhooks for her last breath? She can’t die - not now, not ever, but especially not so soon after Han. The Resistance can’t take these blows - _Luke_ can’t take these heartbreaks. The circumstances make her want to curl up in a corner and cry - Luke Skywalker, the Resistance’s greatest hope, the object of desperate searches over the last fifteen years, returning to his sister seriously injured and the base in turmoil because of it.  
  
Rey can’t help the gasp that escapes her when they enter the med-bay, tears springing hot and sharp to her eyes. The woman she met as a proud general, the woman who shook off the sadness of losing her son to create a force to fight the First Order, the woman who was coordinating missions and presiding over meeting just days after her husband’s murder, is now a shell of a person unconscious in the room that seems so pale it’s sickly, machines surrounding the bed beeping harshly in the silence. “Her presence is still strong,” Luke says, his soft words breaking the silence so suddenly that Rey starts. “A little dimmer than usual, but still constant. I think she’ll be okay.”  
  
“There should be a guard on this door, all the time,” Rey says, the words stumbling from her lips, nervous and shaking, her mind moving frantically. “I know there aren’t enough people, but there _should_ be. She’s our leader, she’s the general, what are we going to do if she...if...” She can’t bring herself to say the words, they stick in her throat like glass shards, and she has to sit down, breath coming in rough, heaving gasps. “Who could’ve done this?”

* * *

 

The hologram flickers to life in the darkness, exposing the terrifying face, the eyes huge and dark and blazing with anger. “How could you have considered a clever course of action? That woman is not stupid - she has a strong imprint in the Force, even with minimal training! And now she is still alive, and she will be given greater protection because you have _failed_!”  
  
“I’m sorry, Supreme Leader. I don’t know what came over me.”  
  
The image grows bigger as the face moves closer, the eyes impossibly huge. “Perhaps I should pass this task to another? Perhaps you have developed _attachments_ which make it impossible for you to do your duty to our Order?”  
  
“To send another in when I have gained their trust so completely would be foolish, Supreme Leader. I made a mistake - but I can fix this.”  
  
“You can kill her? Is she not like a mother to you? Do you not treasure her feelings towards you?”  
  
“Never, Supreme Leader. Her death will be the catalyst we need to destroy the Resistance once and for all. Trust me - I will not allow her or her brother to remain alive to escape us.”


End file.
